


Waited So Long (for Someone to Take Us Back Home)

by cold_feets



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 5 Times Fic, Gen, Hypothermia, Kid Fic, Kidnapping, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-06
Updated: 2011-11-06
Packaged: 2017-10-25 18:06:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/273209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cold_feets/pseuds/cold_feets
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five times Sherlock was late, and one time John was late, too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Waited So Long (for Someone to Take Us Back Home)

**Author's Note:**

> With a brief but no less gratuitous appearance by Sherlock and John's daughter Bel from [Can't Say No](http://archiveofourown.org/works/264086). But only in one section. Also gratuitous hypothermia? But only in one section.

.1.

Sometimes, John learns, Sherlock does not save the day.

Sometimes, people die, and Sherlock can't stop it. Sometimes, it's the nanny or the brother or a completely random madman, and things just don't add up quickly enough.

Sherlock is human, John reminds himself. And humans make mistakes. He's lost patients before. The first one is always hard. The ones after that are always just as hard.

For a week, Sherlock reexamines every bit of evidence. He revisits crime scenes, now completely contaminated and long since useless. He doesn't sleep or eat. The case isn't over for him. Not until he sees what he should have seen from the start. Not until he thinks of the one thing he didn't think of.

"I missed something," he mutters, rifling through notes and photographs. "I should have seen..."

"If you figure it out now," John says, "it's not going to save them." He leans against the doorway and watches Sherlock flip through a pile of crime scene photos.

"Of course not! That's not the point!" Sherlock snaps, the papers wrinkling a bit in his fists.

John pinches the bridge of his nose. "Yeah, it never is, is it."

"What?"

He can see the moment Sherlock realizes what he's said: his shoulders fall, the papers still, and his chin drops to his chest, a frustrated sigh escaping him.

"John..."

But John is already out the door.

 

.2.

They lock him in a freezer. _Who_ locks people in _freezers?_ And yet he can't help but admit that it's surprisingly effective as he tries to shove himself upright with his hands tied behind his back and his ankles bound together. The walls are thick, so even if there was anyone around, they wouldn't hear him shouting. And it won't take long before the cold slows him down enough to eliminate any threat he might pose, which is practically nonexistent, bound as he is.

He takes a few deep breaths. _Stay calm. Stay focused. There's a way out of this._

His phone is in his coat pocket, and it only takes him a few minutes of careful wiggling to send it skittering to the floor.

He fumbles for a moment, but ends up with the phone in his hands behind his back, and curses technology under his breath. Bloody touchscreens. He really misses buttons. He pokes blindly, making his best guess, and hoping there's service in a fucking walk-in freezer.

"Come on, come on," he mutters, waiting for the reassurance of the phone ringing. There's nothing. "Shit."

The door swings open, and already the brightness of the light from outside makes him flinch. He's only been here a few minutes. Hasn't he?

"You think I'm stupid, do you? You think you and that friend of yours can come sniffing around here and I won't notice?"

"Friend? What--"

The man grabs the side of his head and smashes his skull into one of the shelves, leaving him slumped to the floor, unable to brace himself with his arms.

"Don't," he warns as John blinks away stars.

"That was really unnecessary," John groans. He shuts his eyes and tries to breathe through the pain. A boot comes down near his head, and the brittle crack of plastic tells him his mobile is no longer in working order, signal or not.

The man hauls John up by his collar, and John winces, waiting for the next blow.

"Sit here, and sit quiet," the man spits. "I'm gonna deal with you later."

He drops John to the floor once more, and a moment later, the door shuts again behind him.

"Christ," John hisses. The floor is freezing, and he needs to sit up. Sherlock sent him to investigate. He'll know something is up when John doesn't return, and he'll come looking for him. He just needs to wait it out. And not on this floor.

He can feel the blood dripping from his head. His eyelids are heavy, and even though he knows he ought to fight it, he gives in when everything starts to go black.

***

He comes to again with a sharp jerk. He's shivering violently, teeth chattering in his skull. His head aches. His whole _body_ aches, stiff and cold, twisted and awkward against the floor. He takes a few steeling breaths and pushes himself back into a seated position. Everything spins a bit, but steadies again after a moment. A few feet away, his mobile is well and truly smashed, hopeless. He can't even tell how much time has passed.

Could be minutes. Could be hours. And hours is a bad thing.

John leans back against one of the shelves and buries his nose in the collar of his coat as best he can. He can't feel his hands. Should have worn gloves. Should have waited for Sherlock. Should have fought harder. Should have...

It's a rubbish way to die, locked in a freezer.

He shuts his eyes and focuses on just breathing. More than once, he finds himself jolting awake, never having meant to let himself drift off.

The door swings open, light spills in, and John tries to pull himself together enough to take whatever beating is about to be handed down to him. But when he looks, there's a familiar silhouette in the doorway.

"Sherlock."

Sherlock grabs him under the arms and pulls him out of the freezer, John's feet dragging helplessly along the floor.

"C-cutting it a b-bit close, there," John says, teeth chattering, as Sherlock cuts the ropes from around his wrists and ankles.

"If you're well enough to complain, I had another half an hour at least," Sherlock says. He tilts John's head in his hands, taking in the cut on his forehead, then unzips John's coat, and drags it down his arms. "Lestrade is on his way with the medics. Are you all right?"

John blinks slowly in response.

Sherlock leans over him and grabs the hem of his jumper, and John can _feel_ the warmth coming off of him. He leans into it, pressing his face into Sherlock's shoulder. "Why would you lock someone in a f-freezer?" he asks because he _really_ wants to know.

"They've all seen too many films these days," Sherlock says as he hauls the jumper over John's head. "I miss proper criminals."

"I miss buttons," John sighs. He reaches out with stiff, numb fingers and tries to grab onto Sherlock, pull him close again. "Why does this keep happening?"

"What?" Sherlock asks.

"You taking my clothes off."

Sherlock grins, pulls his own coat off, and wraps it around John. "You should be flattered. I don't do this for just anyone."

John tries to imagine Sherlock taking off someone else's clothes and giggles, on the edge of hysterics. Every breath shakes in his chest as Sherlock wraps his arms around him.

"You tried to fight them off before they threw you in there. You perspired. Sitting around in wet, half-frozen clothes isn't going to get you any warmer."

"You're warm," John mumbles.

"I wasn't locked in a freezer."

John slides his hands up underneath Sherlock's jacket, pressing against the flat heat of Sherlock's back through the thin fabric of his shirt. Sherlock inhales sharply, but doesn't ask John to move, and that's why John like Sherlock. He could fall asleep. Right here on this dirty floor, tucked up against Sherlock. It would be _wonderful_. A bit ridiculous, perhaps, but he really doesn't care about that right now.

"D'you do that?" he asks when he sees the larger of the two thugs who grabbed him knocked out on the floor on the other side of the kitchen. "S'not good."

"It was necessary. Good or not good doesn't factor into it."

"Should," John tells him. "People matter."

John feels himself drifting under again as Sherlock pulls him closer. "Only some."

 

.3.

"Come on," Lestrade says, clapping both of them on the shoulders after another case solved. "Pints on me."

John's exhausted, his legs aching from running halfway across London, his shoulder twinging from a rough shove against a brick wall, and his eyes nearly crossing from three broken hours of sleep in the past two days. A pint sounds _divine_.

"I'll come," John says. "Sherlock?"

"No," Sherlock says automatically, not even glancing up from his phone.

"You don't have to actually drink," Lestrade says. "The point of pints isn't always the pints themselves, you know."

"I have something at the flat that I need to check on."

John knows that by "something" he means an experiment, probably involving body parts and probably ones that he acquired through less than legal means, and at least he's figured out not to mention that in polite conversation.

"Suit yourself," John tells him. "I won't be late."

Sherlock finishes his text and pockets his phone again. "Right." He squeezes John's arm as he breaks away from them back in the direction of the flat. If Lestrade sees, he doesn't let on.

At least, not until they're settled at a table in the back of the pub, drinks in hand.

"When did all that happen, then?"

John frowns. "What?"

"I know Sherlock thinks I'm an idiot," Lestrade says, narrowing his eyes, "but don't you start, too."

For the time it takes for him to gulp down a few swallows of lager, John considers denying it. Not because he minds Lestrade knowing, but because it's easier than trying to explain. One day they were John and Sherlock, same as always, then the next...they were something else. And ever since, John's been groping about like a man blindfolded, trying to find the boundaries of it all. He's been a bit thrilled and slightly terrified to find that there aren't many.

He'd say it's been an interesting few months, but life took a decided turn for the interesting the minute he met Sherlock.

"Don't know exactly," he says at last. "Just sort of did."

Lestrade nods, and John's hands tense around his glass, waiting for some disapproving remark or to be warned off or _something_.

"No, no, it's good," Lestrade assures him. "John, no one really _got_ Sherlock til you, and not for a lack of trying. And, well," he adds with a shrug, "if you get Sherlock, I reckon there aren't many people who get _you_."

John can't argue. He would have at one point in his life. Would have thought himself a fairly easy person to get along with. But then he came back after Afghanistan, and everything was different. _He_ was different.

"You know, I had thought in the beginning you'd be a good influence on him. Mellow him out a bit." Lestrade shakes his head and smirks as he raises his glass to his lips. "Instead, he's just made _you_ worse. When it's the two of you together, you're both intolerable instead of just him. But at least I don't worry that I'm going to walk into that flat and find him dead anymore."

John lets out a weak chuckle. "Well, that's one of us."

Lestrade shakes his head again. "All joking aside, you're good for him. Truly. I never saw him laugh before you turned up, not at proper things. A murder, sure. Always thought he was just this poor sod who liked the puzzles so he didn't sit at home with nothing to think about but how miserable he was."

"I don't think you're too far off, there," John says.

Lestrade grins. "Another round?"

"Please."

John pulls out his phone while Lestrade is at the bar. _Should have come,_ he texts Sherlock. _Discussing your favorite topic: you._

_  
_How dull.  
SH_   
_

Lestrade returns and sets a glass down in front of John. He leans back in his chair, watching the crowd for a few minutes, and John thinks Sherlock is wrong. He's willing to bet Lestrade knows what every person in this pub has been doing since they got here, who they talked to, what they're wearing. He sees more than he lets on, knows more than he'll ever say. Lestrade's not a bad copper. It's just that Sherlock's better. And Lestrade doesn't let something like the fact that he might not be the best get in the way of saving lives by using whatever means he has at his disposal.

"Five years you've known Sherlock, then. How'd you meet him?"

"Think he'll mind?" Lestrade asks. "You asking me questions?"

"It's having to answer questions himself that he minds."

Lestrade leans forward and rests his elbows on the table and considers for a minute. "Knew him as a junkie before I knew him as anything else. Used to spend the night locked up every month or so. Then one night, he calls one of my guys over to the cell, tells him this kid he's in with is innocent and here's why. Figured it just from overhearing things and a quick glance at a file as we booked him. We all had a laugh about it, but turns out he was right. Only it took a week for us to come to that same conclusion."

John grins. It never stops astounding him, what Sherlock is capable of, how easily he can see what others can't. "So then what?"

"I made him a deal," Lestrade says with a shrug. "He stays clean, he gets work. The second he goes back, we're through."

"And that's worked?"

"So far. You see how he gets. He's all right when he stays busy. When he doesn't, it's disaster."

"Disaster might be a bit of an exaggeration."

Lestrade shakes his head. "You didn't know him before."

"Before what, exactly?"

John startles at the sound of Sherlock's voice and turns to find him looming over his shoulder. "What are you--"

"I figured you'd need an escort home by the end of it anyway." He pulls over a chair and sits down beside John, reaching across him to snag his half empty drink. He sniffs it curiously then helps himself to a few swallows.

John just beams at him, absolutely dopey, he's certain. But Sherlock's here, having pints with them, and somehow it feels like bloody Christmas.

"Oh, stop," Sherlock says, equal parts derision and affection. "Ten minutes, and then we're off."

John starts to giggle, and Lestrade grins down into his glass. Sherlock's arm settles along the back of John's chair and doesn't move until they finally leave three rounds and eighty-one minutes later.

 

.4.

It's half four when Sherlock gets in, the thud of his feet on the stairs unmistakable in the still of the flat. The door to the bedroom opens, and Sherlock flops unceremoniously upon the bed, burrowing close into John's side.

"What..why are you _wet?_ "

"Fell in the Thames."

"Get out of the bed, you idiot!"

Sherlock grunts in disapproval. "Cold."

For a second, John lies there and reminds himself that he does in fact care very much about Sherlock and does not actually want to throttle him or watch him die of pneumonia. Then he throws the covers back and drags Sherlock out of bed by the wet wool of his coat. Sherlock puts up minimal resistance as John shoves him into the bathroom and starts stripping him down while the bath fills.

"You're an absolute fool," John mutters, adding Sherlock's sopping shirt to the growing pile on the floor.

Sherlock ducks forward and presses his mouth to John's, just quick, one chilled palm pressing to John's cheek.

"Yes, yes, you're sorry. Just get in the bath," John tells him.

Shrelock's mouth curls into a small smile, and he turns and folds himself into the bath. John starts to gather up Sherlock's things when Sherlock's dripping fingers tug at his wrist. "No, stay."

"Sherlock, it's four in the morning. I don't want to have a bath. I want to sleep. Only now I've got to do the bed up as well."

"Leave it. We'll sleep downstairs," Sherlock says. "Stay. You wouldn't want me to fall asleep in the bath and drown, would you?"

"Sherlock."

"Just stay. Please?"

John sighs and pulls his shirt over his head because at this point it's easier than arguing.

Sherlock leans forward, and John tucks himself behind him, cramped and awkward in the too small bath, but the press of skin, the curve of Sherlock's hand around his bent knee, and the heat of the water do their part to make up for it. Sherlock settles his head back against John's shoulder, eyes shut, and John pushes Sherlock's flattened hair back from his forehead.

"Better?"

Sherlock lets out a content sigh, long fingers tracing patterns in the water against John's thigh, and John smiles into his hair, everything else forgotten.

 

.5.

On day six, John calls Lestrade.

"It's been a week," he lies. It feels like it's been a month. "No word. No calls. No notes. Nothing."

"A week isn't all that long for Sherlock."

In the beginning, that would have been true. Sherlock would disappear for weeks at a time without a word, then turn up like there was nothing odd about it, having solved some case halfway around the world. But things have changed. John glances through the doorway where Bel is asleep in his and Sherlock's bed, curled around her stuffed dog (aptly named "Dog"), her face smushed into Sherlock's pillow.

"It is now," he tells Lestrade.

"Well, he's got nothing from me. You know that. I haven't given him anything in weeks."

"Please," John begs.

"I'll see what I can find out. But it's probably just Sherlock doing what he does."

"What's that? Making my life difficult?"

"Exactly," Lestrade says. "I wouldn't worry."

On the fifteenth day, he calls Mycroft, even though every part of him is screaming with betrayal as he dials. This is the last of last resorts, and he knows that. But he doesn't know what else to do.

Mycroft listens wordlessly and makes promises but no guarantees. They'll find him. They might not find him alive.

It's what John is expecting to hear, but that does make it any easier.

He doesn't hear back from either of them until the twentieth day. Or night, rather. Bel is asleep, and he's pacing the front room, furious at Sherlock for not calling or at least saying where he was going, sick with his inability to do anything.

But nearly three weeks in, his mobile finally, finally rings.

"John."

Lestrade.

"We've got him. I'll bring him round. About twenty minutes."

John nods, the phone clutched hot to his ear, and it takes him a moment to remember himself, to pull together enough brain cells to actually speak. "Right. Yes. Good."

He hangs up and takes a deep breath for the first time in three weeks. He stands by the window, eyes fixed on the street, hand fisted in the curtain, and he waits.

Eighteen minutes and forty-three seconds later, the police car pulls up. Lestrade lets Sherlock out of the back, and John finds himself holding his breath. Sherlock never rides with the police, ever, as a rule, and the sight of him unfolding himself from the car is enough to make John tense. John notes the slight limp in his gait, the tension in his right shoulder, the way Lestrade sticks close, one hand extended, but not touching, in case Sherlock should falter.

Injured, then. Not bad enough for the hospital, but worse than he's letting on.

John doesn't move from the window until he hears the door open. Sherlock takes the stairs two at a time, and only pauses for half a heartbeat on the main landing before he disappears up the stairs with barely a glance in John's direction. Part of John wants to scream as he stomps up after him because three weeks gone without a word deserves a bit more than that. But when he gets to the upstairs landing, he sees Sherlock with Bel in his arms, whispering things in her hair as he holds her tight. She nods against his shoulder at whatever he's saying, her small fingers digging into his coat.

John shuts his eyes, wipes a hand down his cheeks when he feels the relieved tears squeeze their way out, and takes a deep breath.

"Go easy on him," Lestrade says, his hand suddenly on John's shoulder. "Wasn't his fault this time."

John nods.

"I'm gonna leave a couple men out front for the night. I want the two of you in my office tomorrow, first thing. And give him a look over. He refused to go to A&E, of course."

"Of course," John agrees absently. "Is he all right?"

"Someone grabbed him. Says he didn't see who. They bashed him over the head, and looks like he's been thumped a couple of times between then and now, but nothing too bad. He's had worse." Lestrade steps in front of him, and John finally looks up at him properly. "He was scared," Lestrade says, voice low. "Like I've never seen him before. And all he wanted to do was come here and see that little girl of his. I know it's not what you're asking, but I'd say it's the most all right I've ever seen him. Not too long ago, Sherlock Holmes would have come back from being kidnapped like it was the best holiday he could ask for."

Lestrade sees himself out, and John watches as Sherlock somehow convinces Isabel to get back into bed and go to sleep. He presses a kiss to her forehead and sits with her a moment longer before pushing himself unsteadily to his feet. He pulls the door mostly shut behind him and leans back against the wall, clearly in pain, his normally slender frame now gaunt, his skin pale and dirty, dark circles blooming under his eyes. There are bruises around his throat, the distinct blush of fingerprints pressed into skin visible even beneath the unfamiliar growth of beard, and John's hands clench at his sides.

"Are you all right?" Sherlock asks.

"Me?!" John lets out a strangled laugh. "Sherlock--"

Sherlock squeezes his eyes shut, clearly frustrated, and hisses, "Are you all right?"

"Yes, I'm fine. We're both fine," he says with a nod towards where Bel is sleeping, "now."

Sherlock lets out a long breath and nods to himself.

"Sherlock--"

Eyes still shut and one hand already waving dismissively, Sherlock rattles off his own injuries. "Mild concussion, a few bruised ribs, sprained ankle, two broken toes, mild lacerations and bruising--"

John carefully crosses the few feet between them and catches Sherlock's hand in both his own. "Sherlock."

Sherlock finally looks at him, eyes wet, his fingers squeezing John's. "They said they'd find you," he whispers. "Find her. And I couldn't stop them. I didn't know, and I couldn't--"

"It's all right," John tells him, and when he gives a tug on his hand, Sherlock steps forward and lets John wrap an arm around him. "She's fine. We're all three of us fine, now. All right?"

Sherlock nods and leans against him heavily, arms tight around his shoulders. John can feel the way each breath Sherlock takes shudders beneath his ribs.

"You should have gone to hospital," John murmurs, his fingers ghosting over the considerable lump at the back of Sherlock's head. "Let them look you over."

"I just wanted to come home," Sherlock says. His voice wobbles a bit on the last word, and John tightens his arms around him, careful of his injuries.

"All right," he murmurs. "All right. Tomorrow, then."

Sherlock nods again and presses a kiss to John's mouth. Then another. And another. "I'm sorry," he says. "Sorry you had to worry. Sorry I couldn't get back and--"

"Shh. Get into bed. I'll be in in a minute."

Sherlock holds on a moment longer, fingers clutching at John's jumper, breath slowly steadying. He presses his forehead to John's, kisses him again, and limps back into the bedroom.

Downstairs, John pushes aside the curtains and peers out the window. The street is quiet and still, and the promised unmarked cars are keeping watch. He checks the locks on the door and sets the alarm. He wants to board up every door and window in the building, drape them in chains. Instead, he climbs back up the stairs.

Bel is sprawled across two-thirds of the bed as she tends to do, her usual strangling grip on Dog abandoned in favor of clutching Sherlock's fingers, her hand absurdly small in his. John can see Sherlock's pale eyes watching her as she sleeps, even as he fights off his own exhaustion.

John slides into bed behind him, his nose tucked against familiar skin, their bodies pressed close in the small space Bel allows them. Sherlock pulls John's arm around him, tangling their fingers together, and he holds on to them both as he finally gives in to sleep.

 

.+1.

It's one of those rare mornings when John wakes first, Sherlock still buried beneath the blankets, steady puffs of warm breath hitting John's shoulder.

They're supposed to meet with Lestrade in about an hour, and if they're going to make it, they really ought to get up now. But the bed is warm, and Sherlock looks like he's dead to the world. John shuts off the alarm, pulls the blankets up over his head to block out the sun, and settles down for a proper lie-in.

"What about Lestrade?" Sherlock murmurs, still half asleep, rubbing his nose against John's arm.

"Sod him," John says. "Go back to sleep."

And for once, Sherlock does as he's told.


End file.
